In reality the Beatles songs werent all that good

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The Nashville machine comes up with the occasional catchy tune or clever bit of wordplay, but on the whole it is the home of predictable formulaic clichéfests and has been for decades. Your admiration for that makes it impossible to take seriously your criticism of anything else.

I disagree with your view OP.

Consider McCartney: he is the most successful recording artist of all time (in terms of overall sales). He is still performing after 50 years. His "Yesterday" is the most covered song of all time, in terms of being recorded by other artists. Not so good?????? Who has matched that achievement?

The Beatles music developed a lot from the early songs during the years they were together. You can't judge them on a few early songs. Their influence on the music world and general culture was immense. Like their idol Elvis, the Beatles will still be remembered in another 50 years' time.

I used to think the Beatles are vastly overrated as musicians, but a few years ago I read a scholarly treatise about their chord progressions. Apparently they used more chords than most other pop artists did (even in their early work), and they would have some chord substitutions at various points to related keys and such where their music was just on the edge of not sounding like what people expect from music. They were "edgy" for their time which is why they sounded new and different to the people of that time, but some of the musical changes they brought to pop culture are now so common that those changes are no longer edgy and may even sound corny or old-fashioned.

They were "tight" as a band too, doubtless from all those hours long days for months and years playing together in Hamburg and Liverpool. At some of their concerts they could not hear themselves over the sound of the screaming fans, but they still were together musically, i.e., hit the changes in the songs at the same time. They had great harmonies in their singing together too, plus they were charming and funny.

I think they became famous partly because the USA especially was looking for distraction after Kennedy was killed. The Beatles showed up a few months after that and things took off for them. It's hard to say whether the Beatles caused some cultural changes or just happened to be caught up in them, but things like pop artists performing their own songs instead of covering other people's stuff, wearing your hair as you like it, and choosing your own path were things the Beatles are associated with.

I respect the guitar craftsmanship of George Harrison and his quest for spiritual truth even if he may have been misled by some of the teachers he went to. I respect the ability of Paul McCartney to write silly pop lyrics and he wasn't bad as a bass player, although none of the Beatles are noted for being the "best" musician-wise on their respective instruments. I liked John Lennon's wit and vision for peace, and Ringo's good nature. Ringo wasn't an outstanding drummer but he could keep a beat, and that is what counts most. I once insulted a drummer in a band I was in by saying we would become the next Beatles. He was highly offended at being compared to Ringo!

The cartoon Family Guy had several funny skits involving the Beatles, some in questionable taste. One of my fave skits was when Ringo brought a song he had written himself to the other Beatles, and Paul took it and put it on the refrigerator door like a drawing from a little kid.

I do love the Beatles movie Help! There's a lot of funny stuff in that movie, and the title track of the movie and the album is one of my favorite songs to play that are written by other people (for the most part when I play guitar I play songs I create myself, not other people's stuff).

I grew up in a very un-Beatles household. My mom is into country and my dad never got into them; my grandpa discouraged my dad from listening to them as a little kid because he thought they were too hippie, and by the time my dad got into music more complex stuff in the AOR scene had gotten big, and after that he took a liking to new wave and alt. Likewise, he never recommended them to me when I was first getting into music, and I grew up with the idea they were just a bunch of manufactured posers who wrote all their songs on acid and had no talent.

Now that i've branched out, I've come to respect them, although I still never got into them. I've listened to every album from Help! through Let It Be, and I've heard enough Beatlesmania-era stuff to know what it was all about. I'm convinced very few people ever actually praised the Beatles for their objective musicianship or lyricism. But it's the fact that by their massive popularity garnered through very smart marketing during Beatlesmania, they made "the group" a very possible design of music-making to land record deals. Even more so, this popularity is what brought psychedelic and art rock into the mainstream after they shook the pop-rock "fab four" thing and started experimenting; I highly doubt Yes, Genesis, Jethro Tull or Pink Floyd would've found an audience as well as they did had all their listeners not compulsively bought Sgt. Pepper beforehand.

The fact that they weren't prodigy musicians or song writers is kind of irrelevant. It's the same reason the Who, Sex Pistols, and Nirvana have had as profound an impact on music as they have: it's more about how you present yourself than how well you play.

Is artistic value and monetary value that same thing? I know I don't purchase my records based on their charting position. McCartney played it safe and it paid off well for him monetarily.

Yeah I have to kind of agree...for whatever reason I was really never into their stuff

In general, I like the Beatles. Obviously their lyrics were pedestrian in the early days--but the Beat Music was innovative for its time. I would never have gone into the city just to hang out by their hotel.

Later, their lyrics became more reflective and poetic. Even later, they got back into their "rock" roots.

Would I say they were transcendent? No.

It's nice to listen to it, though.

It's all down to personal preference, but their position in history is unrivalled. Along with Dylan, they were the driving force behind popular culture in the 60's. They're not my favourite band, but I still think they are the most important band in the history of music. in fact, that's probably faint praise. The musical landscape that they inherited was all 3 chord rock 'n' roll songs with lyrical content no more advanced than boy meets girls, boys courts girl etc. Pop music (or whatever you want to call it), hadn't really evolved since Elvis and the Beatles took the on the mantle. They went from 'She Loves You' to 'Tomorrow Never Knows' in only three years. Imagine what 'Tomorrow Never Knows' would have sounded like in 1966? It would have blown your mind! If you want sophisticated music start from Rubber Soul onwards, and to cite a lack of musicianship is nonsense! They're harmonies were fantastic too! They also released almost two albums a year! Imagine 'Revolver' or 'Abbey Road' after being granted the 3/4 years between albums that bands are afforded these days. The mind boggles! Some previous posters have already mentioned Beatles tunes with great lyrics, but lyrics are not conducive to a great tune. Too many of these tortured geniuses you get today sound like they've swallowed a thesaurus and regurgitated the words back up in a random order.

When viewed with modern eyes, they are decent, but by no means great. However, they were extremely innovative (there chief innovations being in their studio work, but they have many others as well), shaping rock and pop for years to come, and have a lot of good songs.

Last edited by Ganondox on 11 Apr 2014, 2:13 am, edited 1 time in total.

Faith No More is better than The Beatles...and Mike Patton has done far more than just Faith No More. I'm not sure why Wes Borland is at the list, but given the environment they were in all the others were at least as innovative as the Beatles. For one, Gary Numan pioneered synthpop, which changed the face of the music landscape forever, going from guitar based music to electronic based. Considering how relatively popular he is to the Beatles, it can be argued he is much more influential just for the sake of his music. The Beatles had the advantage of the time and the place they were in, the first will always be the first. The Beach Boys and The Velvet Underground were contemporary to the Beatles, and are arguably just as influential.

This analogy gives me a hemorrhage. Oasis is just a ripoff of the Beatles, Nirvana, while they took their sound from other grunge, were a very influential and somewhat innovative, and for many people, make much better music. Frank Zappa is a completely different category all together. Just because your musical taste is britpop doesn't mean britpop is the best.

wow... just.. wow.
an intellectual degeneration? and why is that? i'm going out on a limb here and supposing you're only very superficially familiar with hip hop. let me guess, you're going to give me some cliche about violence and misogyny and gangsta rap.
but it's a vibrant, growing art form that has a spectrum of complexity from the geekiest, backpackeriest underground all the way to something admittedly facepalm f*****g dumb like 50 cent or ja rule. NOT that i'm supposing complex = good. actually, i don't really like either extreme of the spectrum, to be honest.
the point is, your assumption that hip hop is unilaterally across the board a dumbed down degeneration of what was before relatively witty pop lyricism is astonishingly baseless. broaden your horizons a little bit. sheesh. i think you may find to your surprise that hip hop actually stepped up the game for lyrics in some instances (sociopolitical commentary anyone? hip hop? nahhhh..)

ok. enough post hijacking. that being said.. i have really ambivalent feelings about the beatles and i relate to what people on both sides of the argument are saying.

point for: the intuitive grasp they had on harmony and chord progressions was remarkably sophisticated for a pop rock band. seriously. it's just true. it's so true it's practically science. were they the first boy band? actually, no, that'd be not even close to the first, but whatever. they were perhaps the first MASSIVELY popular boy band. yet, every once in a while, a boy band will be special and sort of be talented in spite of its mindless, blatantly commercial origins. yep.

point against: paul mccartney. goddamn. he's sort of a point of origin for almost everything that's trifling, lazy, and stupid about pop music today. really my annoyance is mostly intensified by the fact that he is a crazy talented guy who makes the shittiest s**t possible coming from a talented person. he's got a great voice, an incredible intuitive knack for catchy composition, and a relatively wide appreciation of musical styles. but he writes thoughtless BS. and that annoys me. seems like a waste, and a waste that has been copied by countless artists for countless profits.

point for: the beatles grew. they were one of the first bands that went from mawkish, basically commercial tripe to more introspective spiritual type of stuff by the time they broke up. that's cool. and if people wanna copy that basic developmental arc, i say feel free.

point against: overexposure. this is the same reason that nevermind kinda makes me a bit spiritually queasy to listen to anymore. when something gets co-opted by basically everyone in the western world (and indeed probably everywhere else too), it gets kinda watered down. becomes elevator music. car commercial music. but of course this isn't the beatles' fault (wait didn't the surviving members make a doritos commercial or something.. or am i just imagining that.. i could be full of it,,).

to sum it up.. are they overrated? incredibly overrated, yes. does that make them crap or untalented? far from it.

It's funny when people compare Oasis to Nirvana, because Oasis is like the antithesis of Nirvana in some ways. Nirvana was a grunge band that wrote songs with cynical, sometimes depressing lyrics. Oasis was part of the britpop scene, which emerged as sort of a backlash against the grunge scene, and wrote lyrics that (supposedly, haven't listened to them much) were more positive/uplifting in nature. Nirvana were famous for their use of quiet/loud dynamics, while Oasis were infamous for being a driving force in the "loudness war".

Last edited by mr_bigmouth_502 on 16 Apr 2014, 4:02 am, edited 1 time in total.

To the people who have been saying Zappa is nonsense, unfamiliar musical forms often sound terrible until you start to get used to them. Pretty much everyone hates jazz to start with.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D7VAOuIePVo[/youtube]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8zVaLuJI6U[/youtube]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjYv9gNK4ss&list=PLA46122E711D8B1A6[/youtube]

The thing with Zappa is that many people regard him as a musician's musician. But having seen Zappa Plays Zappa, even his own band of exceptional musicians sort of misses the point - he was one of the most brilliant musical humourists of all time. (Their renditions and re-enactments of his work were great, but they just lacked that biting humour that makes his work so worthwhile for me). Most of his political outlook was sharp and on the money (aside from his straight gender politics which I think are a bit lame....)

He is greatly missed

I've been grooving on this one of late....

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nrxx72AK0ZU[/youtube]

In Nashville songwriting is a craft that is taken seriously. You're used to only Pop Country radio is not what I to which I am referring. Country music used to be poetry- you use "achy breaky heart" and think that is what I am talking about- that is Pop, not Country.. I'm talking about people such as John Prine, Lucinda Williams, Don Gibson, Willie Nelson, Hank Williams Sr, etc. Im not sophisticated enough to like the Beatles? I guess I'm not! Their music does not move me in any way. Everything they do seems manipulative because its trying to show off rather than authentic.